The Ethical Conundrum of The Martian, According to a Harvard Bioethicist

Links

Glenn Cohen liked The Martian, which this morning earned itself seven nominations in the Academy Awards, including a slot in the coveted Best Picture category. The Martian, Cohen says, was one of his top 15 movies of the year, “maybe top 10.”

But Cohen isn’t a film critic. He’s a Harvard Law School professor who specializes in bioethics. And the narrative thrust of The Martian—a Herculean effort to save a stranded Matt Damon—tickled Cohen’s inner ethicist. Not long after seeing the film in theaters, Cohen wrote a short blog post titled “Identified versus Statistical Lives at the Movies.” [...]